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The Real Estate Beat

The Caton Team believes, in order to be successful in the San Fransisco Silicon Valley Real Estate Market we have to think and act differently. We do this by positioning our clients in the strongest light, representing them with the upmost integrity, while strategically maneuvering through negotiations and contracts. Together we make dreams come true.

Month: March 2013

Found this great article by Carolyn Said of the San Francisco Chronicle. Had to share and add my 2 cents are in italics.

Tight inventory – a dearth of homes for sale – is driving bidding wars throughout the Bay Area, sending prices up and leaving scores of disappointed would-be buyers. Homes that do hit the market sell within days.

So few homes are listed for sale that agents are resurrecting old ways of drumming up business – going door to door, leaving cards and flyers and writing personal letters, asking owners if they’re interested in selling. Social networking and e-mail blasts are being used to increase inventory as well.

This is all too true. The Caton Team has started targeting areas, condo complexes, neighborhoods and individual homes to find the right home for our buying clients. It’s that tough! And with some first time buyers, the window is closing as prices creep up. Not to mention we are on the edge of our seats worried if interest rates rise.

“People are going old-school, farming their territory,” said Lynda D, an agent in the East Bay, using real estate agent slang for canvassing neighborhoods.

While tight inventory is a national trend, it’s especially pronounced in the Bay Area.

Alameda County, for instance, had 949 homes for sale in February, down 64 percent from the 2,617 on the market at the same time last year, according to data from Realtor.com, the listings website of the National Association of Realtors. Contra Costa County had 899, down 58 percent from 2,152 in February 2012.

“Those are striking reductions in inventory,” said Errol Samuelson, president of Realtor.com.

While inventory numbers did tick up slightly from January to February, that was a normal seasonal change, not an indication of the logjam loosening.

“After seasonal adjustments, inventory is still falling; the underlying trend is still downward,” said Jed Kolko, chief economist with real estate site Trulia.com.

However, he thinks the rate of decline is slowing.

“Inventory tends to fall the most sharply after prices bottom, as no one wants to sell at the bottom, they just want to buy,” he said. Trulia shows that Bay Area prices bottomed more than a year ago.

Price a factor

Sellers remain reluctant and elusive for several reasons. Those who are still underwater – owing more than their house is worth – have the obvious impediment of not wanting to do a short sale.

But many others “feel underwater based on the price they paid,” Samuelson said. That is, someone who paid $700,000 for a home in 2007 won’t feel good about selling it for $625,000 right now, even though the sale would cover their remaining mortgage.

Some potential sellers, seeing prices surge, are hoping to hold out for more. Others who might want to move up to a bigger house fear that the market frenzy means they won’t be able to find or afford anything else.

This is such a dilemma. If a seller has enough equity, finally, to sell – the next question is – Where do we go? If a seller wants to stay in the Bay Area, selling now means jumping into the buying pool – and that pool is man eat man! So this truly creates a problem.

Now that it’s spring, the busiest real estate season, more homes should start hitting the market. But many agents have been taking matters into their own hands, making pitches directly to potential sellers about why it’s time to get off the fence.

Although there are numerous online sites to track homes for sale, “the way the market is set up now is forcing us to go back to the beginning where (agents) walk up to a door and knock and say, ‘Hi, how are you, my name is … ‘ ” said Adelaida M, a Realtor in San Francisco.

Personal touch

She recently worked with a client seeking a home in San Francisco’s Clarendon Heights neighborhood, above Cole Valley. After losing out with bids, she walked the neighborhood with him and identified houses he particularly liked. Mejia looked up the homeowners and wrote personal letters to each, explaining that her client loved the area and was seeking a house there.

“Three weeks later, one person called me back and said ‘We loved your letter, we’d love to talk even though we’re not on the market, come on over,’ ” she said.

Rich and Renee G, the homeowners, said they received two or three agent solicitations a week after unsuccessfully trying to sell the house last year, but ignored them because they were form letters.

I couldn’t agree more. The Caton Team has taken this stance and only solicits a seller when we have an actual buyer for their home. We’re not trying to just get listings. We are trying to unit buyers and sellers. I personally experienced what it feels like to be a seller for the past three years. Back and forth with my loan modification paperwork, we placed our home on the market and with no offers, pulled it off the market for a spell. During that time I got stacks and stacks of form letters. Truthfully, it was starting to frost my cookies. It was evident all us Realtors are trying to drum up business, but the form letters were bothering me. They were heartless and actually hurt me – because we didn’t really want to sell – but had to. In the end we listed our home in October of 2012 and sold it within weeks! Now, on the other side of the fence, I consider how a homeowner would feel when they get a form letter. Therefore The Caton Team takes the time to write a real letter, talk about the buyers we are representing and take it from there.

“Adelaida’s note was different; more personalized,” Rich said. “We were planning to put the house on the market again, but the note just pre-empted that.”

Her client ended up visiting the house, making an all-cash offer and buying it. “It was a really stress-free experience for both” the buyer and seller, she said.

If you do ask The Caton Team of your Realtor to solicit homes for you – be prepared to pay fair market value or more because if you aren’t willing too – the seller will simply put the home on the market, get multiple offers and sell for top dollar. So in other words, you need to ‘make them an offer they cannot refuse.’

Beating the bushes for sellers is an about-face from just 18 months ago, when the challenge was to find people who wanted to buy.

A corresponding trend is that homes are selling very quickly.

‘Unbelievable’

“The median days on market in Contra Costa is 13 days – that’s unbelievable,” Samuelson said. A year ago it was 33 days.

Redfin has identified another trend it calls “flash sales” – homes that sell within 24 hours of being listed, usually because a buyer swoops in with an offer too good to refuse. Often, those are buyers who have lost other bidding wars and are determined to land a property.

In the past six months, almost 1,000 Bay Area properties went under contract within one day, Redfin said.

That’s the truth. The Caton Team has started showing homes the day they come on the market and are prepared, right then and there, to write an offer if our client likes the home. Gone are the days, for now at least, that you could see a home, think about it, maybe sleep on it, then write the offer. Lately it’s felt like – ‘you like it – let’s write’! And with each offer we write for each buyer, we’re doing everything we can to make the offer more likable to the seller. We are using every tool in our toolbox and the toolbox of our clients.

“I just had that experience at a house in the Oakland hills,” DiVito said. “I held the brokers’ tour just before putting it on the market. A buyer and agent walked in and offered us our list price in cash on the spot.”

Underscoring how much the market has changed, she said her sellers had tried to sell the house a year ago “and could not move this property, even though they lowered the price three times.”

Been there done that. It is amazing how much our real estate market has changed in one year alone. In 2010 and 2011 I had my own condo to sell, and nobody was interested. October 2012 – put it on the market and within days I had several offers. In the end, 20 offers on the same condo. Amazing what a year can do.

Same-day offer

The sellers, who were buying a new home and needed to sell quickly, were happy to take the same-day offer since a cash deal meant it couldn’t be derailed by problems with financing or appraisals.

“Flash-sale terms tend to be really good because (buyers) really want to lock down that property quickly,” DiVito said. “They’re more willing to meet the sellers’ needs to scoop it up before anyone else gets it.”

What happens next with inventory is a big question hanging over the real estate recovery.

“My best guess is that you’ll see an orderly return of inventory to the market,” Samuelson said. “I don’t expect that you’ll see the floodgates open and torrents of properties hit the market. But for each percentage point increase in price, there will be some people who for life reasons have wanted to sell for the past five years – their kids moved out, they got divorced – and now feel that the time is right and they have enough equity.”

Don’t be discouraged if you are a buyer out there. Don’t sit back either. The best education a buyer can have is living the market. So if you are thinking of buying a home, get pre-approved, call The Caton Team or your Realtor and come up with a plan. The more active you are today – the better prepared you will be tomorrow.

I love sharing articles that I think are useful. This one came from my lovely Farmers

Insurance Agent Gary Neely – take a read. And as I always tell my folks – DO NOT CLICK

on links! From anyone! Enjoy!

‘Smishing’ … A new ID theft scam

Have you been “smished” lately? Identity theft expert and consultant Robert Siciliano says to be on the alert for text messages with links — they could be an ID theft scam known as smishing.1

Similar to phishing (which involves email), smishing uses cell phone text messages to deliver bait that’s intended to get you to divulge personal information. Smishing may involve winning a prize or a message that contains something that requires your immediate attention — the link tells you to “click here.” If you click on the infected link, it downloads malware that allows the bad guys to gain control of your device remotely. They can then use your phone from anywhere in the world to access your banking information, credit card data and the like.

What to do If you receive a text message that asks for sensitive information:

Do not reply to the message.

Do not click on any of the links that may be embedded in the message.

Contact your carrier’s privacy or fraud team. If their company name or brand is used in efforts to fraudulently obtain personal information, they may choose to pursue legal action.

Contact your bank or financial institution to be sure your accounts have not been compromised.

Visit the FTC Identity Theft website to learn more about how to minimize damage from identity theft. If you believe that you have been a victim of a smishing scam, you can file an online complaint with the Federal Trade Commission’s Complaint Assistant.

Bottom line: Avoid clicking

Save someone from getting smished As technology provides new ways to expose and defend against familiar scams, clever con artists devise new ones. We’ll continue to keep you informed and ask that you share this with loved ones and friends — smish be gone, forward this on!

Great article I had to share by Carolyn Said in the SF Chronicle Friday. It falls in line with what The Caton Team has advised our buying clients lately. The market has definitely turned up the heat. And I honestly have mixed feelings about this. Don’t get me wrong – I am so happy to see our real estate climate heal from the crash. But I don’t want to see another bust either! My heart goes out to our first time buyers – most of who are pulling their hair out – trying to save enough of a down payment to compete with cash buyers – watching their smartphone apps track interest rates and counting their pennies, rather twenty dollar bills, when the rate sneaks up a half a percent. I’m also excited for sellers who’ve been waiting for the chance to sell without bringing money to the table. But then the next question arises – where do we go if we sell? The SF Peninsula is experiencing a unique real estate market and we are grateful for the opportunity. Enjoy this article….I’ve added my 2 cents in italics – please share your opinions too!

With high demand, low inventory, bidding wars return

In the latest sign of a rebounding real estate market, eager buyers vying for a limited pool of properties pushed Bay Area median home prices 24.6 percent higher in February compared with last year, according to a real estate report released Thursday.

“Drum-tight inventory, lower (interest) rates than most people alive have ever seen, and in some areas record levels of investor purchases (created) an unusual environment,” said Andrew LePage, analyst at San Diego’s DataQuick, which produced the report.

Another big factor – “unleashing of pent-up (buyer) demand,” he said. During the downturn, “for years, some people sat on the sidelines, afraid to buy. Now there’s been a shift in psychology in the past year with people switching from fearing prices might fall more, to fearing they will go up, so they want to buy now.”

This is so true. I myself was sitting in the seller seat since 2009 – it felt like no one was looking to buy. For years we were “on the market” with no offers in site. After pulling my condo off the market for one more try at the loan modification game – by October 2012 – I stuck out the For Sale sign again and within a week I had several offers. In the end 20 offers in had, 10 over the asking price and 5 buyers more than willing to pay a the upcoming HOA assessment! What a change in the tide!

An improving economy and job growth – factors that are stronger here than elsewhere in the country – also feed buyer demand.

We are blessed to live in the Silicon Valley where the tech, bio-chemical industries call home.

February’s sales median for the nine-county region was $405,000, compared with $325,000 in February 2012. It was the fourth straight month in which prices rose more than 20 percent compared with the prior year, and the ninth consecutive month of double-digit increases, DataQuick said.

The same dearth of inventory that amped up prices caused the volume of sales to slump 6.1 percent compared with a year earlier. A total of 5,404 new and resale homes and condos changed hands in the region in February, DataQuick said.

Return of bidding wars

Realtors around the area report that tight inventories are spurring ferocious bidding wars over properties – a phenomenon that holds true at all price points.

In Berkeley, John and Judith of the Grubb Co. sold three homes in recent weeks that listed for more than $1 million and went for substantial amounts above asking. One architecturally distinctive home was listed at $1.295 million but sold for $1.8 million, all cash – more than half a million dollars, or 39 percent, above the asking price.

At a different point on the scale, Annie, an agent with ZipRealty in the East Bay, recently took an investor client to tour a $399,000 four-bedroom tract home in Dublin.

“We drove up and saw all these people in a line,” she said. “I was thinking, ‘What the hey?’ and then I realized it was to get in this particular house. It’s human nature; if people think they can’t get something, they want it more. We stood in line for over an hour to get in.”

Her client offered $92,000 over asking and lost out to another investor who bid $100,000 more than the list price, she said. There were 40 offers.

“It’s an investor’s market right now,” Judith said. “Our first-time home buyers … are having a really hard time getting an offer accepted. It’s hard for them to compete with investors.”

Absentee buyers

Indeed, investors continued to be powerful forces in the market. Absentee buyers accounted for an all-time high of 28.2 percent of February sales, DataQuick said. All-cash buyers also hit a record, representing 31.9 percent of February sales. Historically, cash transactions have been about 12.9 percent of sales.

Realtor.com data show that listings here are being snapped up much more quickly than elsewhere in the nation. In Alameda County, for instance, listings go into escrow on average within 14 days of hitting the market. Nationwide, it takes 98 days for houses to sell.

Around the Bay Area, inventories of for-sale homes are about half what they were a year ago, Realtor.com shows. By contrast, nationwide, inventories are down about 16 percent compared with last year, Samuelson said.

That’s true in many micro-markets as well. Take San Francisco’s Nob Hill, for instance. A year ago, it had 30 homes for sale. Now it has just 15, according to Redfin.

Kiesha S, a listing specialist with Redfin, is preparing a two-bedroom Nob Hill condo – a remodeled unit that retains its early 1900s character, including stained glass windows, wood wainscoting and two fireplaces – to hit the market next week for $799,000, a relative bargain in that neighborhood.

She’s already had six agents ask if they could make pre-emptive offers.

“There’s so little inventory that things are definitely skewed in sellers’ favor,” she said. “Right now there seems to be a surge of buyers.”

Fewer distress sales

DataQuick said that changes in the market mix, such as fewer bargain-priced distress sales and more high-end homes, account for about half of the median’s increase. In other words, all Bay Area home values did not jump 25 percent in February, although values definitely are rising across the board. Distress sales – foreclosures and short sales, both often sold at a discount – are still above their historic norms but are declining.

About a third of February’s existing-home sales were distressed; a year ago more than half (53.4 percent) were foreclosures or short sales, DataQuick said. Just 13.6 percent of resales were foreclosures in February, the lowest level since November 2007.

At their peak in February 2009, foreclosures accounted for 52 percent of all resales. Short sales also declined, but not as much. They were 21.4 percent of resales, versus 27.0 percent a year ago.

The number of homes selling for more than $500,000 rose 27.7 percent compared with last year, while those less than $500,000 fell 14.4 percent, DataQuick said.

Prices, which went into free fall during the downturn, are still far off their peaks. The Bay Area median reached a high of $665,000 in summer 2007 and a low of $290,000 in March 2009. DataQuick said that if the current rate of increase holds up, the Bay Area prices will be halfway back to their peak this spring or summer.

By Carolyn Said

As a full time Realtor this is exciting news for growth in our area. As a potential buyer, I know I cannot save fast enough to compete with the overbids and cash offers coming down the pipeline. There is a small window for some buyers today, a window that can shut if interest rates rise while prices are also climbing.

My advise to buyers – get approved and get out there NOW! Be clear on your financial goals; be sure you have done your math and know what you can afford. Then look at what you can buy and re-evaluate your situation. The Caton Team is here to help – every step of the way – please call or email your questions or comments – info@TheCatonTeam.com

My advise to sellers – if you’ve been waiting for market and price recovery – now is the time! It appears some sellers don’t even need to prepare their home for sale, just listing the home on the market will get a line around the block. The Caton Team is here to help too!

After a great open house yesterday with candid discussions with the buyers out there. It was great to find this article this morning in the Sunday paper regarding what Realtors in the Bay Area were already thinking. If you want to call our glorious SF Peninsula home – now is the time. We hit bottom, whether it was 2009 or 2012. With limited inventory and low rates driving renters from out under their rock – homes are selling with multiple offers and for over their listed price. And with demand this strong – we don’t feel prices are going to fall anytime soon. Take a read and let me know your thoughts. Comment or email us at info@thecatonteam.com! Enjoy!

Home Buyers Face Dilemma with Housing Shortage

The sharp drop in homes for sale poses a tough choice for buyers: Jump in now and compete with hordes of others or wait until inventory improves. If you buy now, you might have to pay above asking. But if you wait, you could end up paying an even higher price and a higher interest rate if you need a loan. That’s because inventory won’t improve until prices rise enough to get more homeowners to sell and more builders to break ground.

The inventory shortage is especially acute in California. Of the 30 largest housing markets, the four with the biggest drops in homes listed for sale on Zillow in February compared with February of last year were Sacramento (48 percent), Los Angeles, San Francisco (41 percent) and San Diego. Although listings are increasing on a month-to-month basis as the busy spring season gets under way, Trulia Chief Economist Jed Kolko predicts they won’t start rising on a year-over-year basis for a year or more.

An example of that: “In all of Millbrae, there was one listing two months ago. There are about a dozen now,” says Roger Dewes, a Coldwell Banker agent on the Peninsula. In a normal market, there might be 20. “We are not there yet, but going from one to 12 is quite a leap,” he says.

Experts cite five factors contributing to the inventory shortage:

Fewer foreclosures are hitting the market. “California did a good job of disposing of its backlog” of distressed properties, says Zillow Chief Economist Stan Humphries.

In California, where most foreclosures are handled out of court, the process is taking about 11 months on average, according to RealtyTrac. In New York and New Jersey, where foreclosures go through a court proceeding, the process is taking 36 and 32 months, respectively.

Many people still owe more than their homes are worth. If they sold now, they would have to come up with extra cash to pay off their loan. Although prices have rebounded from their lows, 23.3 percent of homes with a mortgage in San Francisco, San Mateo and Marin counties were still underwater in the fourth quarter of 2012, according to Zillow.

Even if they are not underwater, many owners won’t sell for less than they paid. If they bought near the peak, it may take a while before they are ready to budge.

The median price paid for a new or resale home or condo in the nine-county Bay Area was $415,000 in January. That’s less than halfway between its low of $290,000 in March 2009 and its high of $665,000 set in June/July 2007, according to DataQuick.

Many people, even if their homes are worth more than they paid, won’t sell because they are afraid they won’t be able to buy another house. “It becomes a game of musical chairs; they are afraid to get out because they can’t get back in,” Humphries says. This becomes “a self-reinforcing cycle” that keeps homes off the market.

The housing bust put new construction on hold.

The shortage comes at a time when demand is rising in the Bay Area, not just from regular buyers but from investors, second-home buyers and foreign buyers, especially from Asia.

‘Heck of a wreck’

The result is stories like this: A 1,500-square-foot home on Clipper Street on San Mateo’s east side, advertised as a “heck of a wreck,” attracted 97 offers in the first eight days, says listing agent Claire Haggarty of NBT Realty Services.

The home was listed in mid-January at $375,000, which Haggarty considered “a little under market.” It sold for $510,000 in an all-cash deal with no inspections, no contingencies and a 10-day close.

At some point, prices will rise enough to shake lose more inventory, but it won’t happen immediately. Based on what’s happening around the country, Kolko says inventory tightens fastest in the first 12 months after prices hit a bottom. “Everybody wants to buy at the bottom and nobody wants to sell at the bottom,” he says.

About 12 months after hitting bottom, inventory continues to decline, albeit at a slower pace. But it won’t increase on a year-over-year basis until at least two years after hitting bottom, he predicts. If you adjust for the mix of homes sold, Kolko says prices bottomed in February 2012 nationwide and in most parts of California and the Bay Area. (The San Jose metro area bottomed earlier, in June 2011.)

Although DataQuick shows Bay Area home prices bottoming in 2009, that’s when most homes being sold were low-priced. The middle and upper end of the market bottomed in early 2012, says DataQuick’s Andrew LePage.

If you believe Kolko’s two-year rule, inventory won’t begin increasing on a year-over-year basis until at least early 2014 in most areas. Humphries says it might improve earlier, by the end of the year, but “this spring will still be challenging from an inventory perspective.” If you wait until next year to buy, the market may be cooler but prices are likely to be higher. There’s also a risk that interest rates will be higher, he says.

Sweet spot

The sweet spot for buyers might be this summer. Even though inventory is falling year-over-year, “the seasonal pattern means there will be more homes on the market in the summer,” Kolko says. “Search traffic peaks in the spring, but inventory peaks in July.” Many buyers also go on vacation in July and August, Dewes says.

The decision to buy or wait “really comes down to a fundamental decision about how long you will be in a home,” Humphries says. “If you want to be in a home long enough to make buying better than renting, make that decision as soon as you can.”

In the city of San Francisco, the breakeven point where it makes more sense to own is 3.7 years, Humphries says. “If you will be there more than 3.7 years, I’d say buy now.”

I enjoy reposting articles I find so I don’t sound like I’m shouting from my soap box all day long. This artcile, in the Sunday Real Estate section was a great read – please enjoy and if you have any questions – ask me – Info@TheCatonTeam.com or call at 650-568-5522

Q: What are the biggest mistakes buyers make?

A: In this fast-paced market, it is still important for buyers to remember the fundamentals of purchasing a home. The items listed below will always be relevant, and they are important issues for buyers to be aware of, and try to avoid:

1. Failing to read documents they receive from their lender and their agent. Buyers receive a lot of information after escrow is opened, which can be overwhelming. But it is imperative that these reports, ranging from disclosures from the seller, to preliminary title reports from the escrow company, to all the various inspection reports completed, be carefully reviewed by the buyer, and they should be encouraged to ask questions. Call on your escrow officer, inspectors, real estate agent and lender until you are completely comfortable and understand all the paperwork you have received.

2. Time is of the essence in all things real estate. There are so many people involved in a transaction, and it is important that all items requested of the buyer from their lender, or their agent, be responded to as quickly as possible. If not, a delay could cost them dearly, from an increase in their loan rate, to even losing the property by not being able to remove a loan contingency in a timely manner.

Another area where the buyer needs to move quickly is when they have identified their dream home. Hesitating a day could mean losing out to another buyer. A slow response to a counteroffer could lose the home to a more aggressive buyer.

3. A buyer’s financials must be in order, and it is most important they don’t make any large purchases during the escrow period, pay bills late, incur derogatory marks on their credit report or change jobs. Make sure to stay in close contact with a lender before making any major money moves.

I love helping my clients buy and sell their home. But what really gets my blood pumping is home renovation. I truly enjoy seeing a home before and after a client puts their touches into their space. However, home renovation is costly and sometimes it doesn’t add up. Please enjoy this article about which home projects get the most bang for your buck! Let me know what you think!

Home owners are investing in their homes once again, according to recent industry surveys that point to a strong rebound taking hold in home remodeling. Home owners also may be seeing higher gains from some of these remodeling projects at resale, according to the most recent Cost vs. Value Report, which reviews the top remodeling projects that offer the highest returns at resale. The Cost vs. Value Report is conducted each year by Remodeling Magazine, in conjunction with REALTOR(R) Magazine.

So, which remodeling projects offer the potential for some of the biggest pay-backs at resale? The following mid-range remodeling jobs offer the highest returns, according to the 2013 Cost vs. Value Report.